Two and a Half Minute Date
by Tiny.Dncer
Summary: Sakura mentioned to Ino that her first date with Sasuke only lasted two and a half minutes. This is that date.


Kakashi looked at Sasuke in surprise.

"Why do you need to leave the village? You just got back."

'There's somewhere I need to go. I won't be long. And I'm not going alone. Sakura's coming with me."

"Ah. So that's what this is about." Kakashi chuckled, visibly relaxing as he looked over at his former student. It was about time he finally reciprocated. "Well, if you can actually get her out of the hospital, then you have no complaint from me. She could use a break. But many have tried and failed on that front."

"She'll come if I ask." Sasuke stated arrogantly. They both knew he was right.

* * *

Sakura stifled a yawn as she looked over her proposal. The Children's Mental Health Clinic was outgrowing its trial stages. It was producing results and growing rapidly. So many had been scarred by the effects of the war, even now two years later. Trauma like that never fully went away and so many children were hurting because of it. The program needed an expansion, which brought her back to the proposal she was working on. She glanced at the clock noting that it was only 1pm but that had lost it's meaning. After all, she had been working since 9am the day before.

She turned her attention back to her proposal and began adding some data charts when a storming chakra signature filled her office.

"Sasuke-kun!" She greeted warmly.

"Have you been here all night?" She had been the one to greet him at the gate when he returned before going to the hospital for a medical exam, as all shinobi were required after missions. She had been the one to check him partially to keep squealing nurses away from him, but also for a more practical reason. Checking eyes like his required very careful and precise chakra control that only really she, Tsunade, and Shizune had. He figured she just would have gone home after she finished but evidentially, that wasn't the case.

"Yeah. After you left there was a really intense emergency surgery that came up and…" she rambled on not even realizing that her hands had begun filling in charts and graphs again. She really had changed so much since she was younger. Now, even with Sasuke, her biggest weakness and strength, standing in front of her, she was still focused and dedicated to her work. Something that didn't escape Sasuke's attention or admiration. "Why are you here Sasuke-kun? Are you not feeling well?"

"Hn. Come with me." And with that he turned and walked out her office door.

"Wait where are we going?" She asked with concern before following him out. "Is everything alright?"

They walked out the hospital and towards the village's main gate. She expected to turn at some point but as Sasuke headed straight for the exit, her concern grew.

"Sasuke-kun are you leaving again? You just got back?"

"Don't worry. This is just a day trip. Besides, you're coming too." And with that he walked through the main gates and jumped up into the tree line. Sakura following confused behind him.

* * *

"Woah" Sakura stared in awe of the place before her. They were standing on a grassy cliff edge looking over the glittering ocean. There was a lamp that seemed to be coming out of a jagged shining pink crystal and a bench that sat facing the view. She walked straight to the edge and looked out. Beneath the cliff was a small forest. The tallest of the tree tops just jutting in to view, framing the glittering water.

"Sakura."

"What is this place Sasuke-kun?" She asked joining him on the bench where he sat.

"I found it while traveling. "

"It's beautiful." She murmured looking out again and softly smiling.

"Aa." Sasuke's eyes never left her face. "Sakura."

She turned her green eyes to him. "What is it Sasuke-kun?"

"Naruto wrote me a letter recently. In it he said that you mentioned my dream of joining the Konoha Police Force. How did you know about that? By the time we were on team 7 my dream was revenge." Sasuke noted that she seemed a bit surprised though whether it was that Naruto had mentioned it to him, or the fact that Sasuke had initiated a conversation with her, he wasn't sure.

"Well…you probably don't remember this, but when we had just started the academy, Iruka-sensei asked us to write down our dreams on a piece of paper. I don't even remember what I wrote down at first—something silly like being your wife probably…"

Her words began to jar a memory loose.

_There they were five years old. Iruka asked them to write down their dreams. He found himself looking out towards the Uchiha district a small smile making its way to his face. He didn't have to think too hard about what his dream was. He already knew. He was going to live up to his name. He was going to join the Konoha Police Force and protect everyone in the village, whether they were ninja or civilian. He turned back to his paper to make note of this. In his peripheral vision, he saw the pink haired girl next to him jump and cover her paper. Her face bright red._

"Iruka-Sensei asked if anyone wanted to share what they wrote—of course Naruto went off…"

"_Now would anyone like to share what their dream is?" Iruka-sensei looked out at the students, a friendly and encouraging smile on his face. Sasuke almost felt compelled to raise his hand. Until the loud annoying voice of Naruto Uzumaki erupted from the front of the room._

"_I'm gonna be Hokage! Believe it! Then everyone in the village will recognize me and stop treating me like a nobody! Believe it!"_

_The room erupted in laughter. _

"After that, Iruka-sensei called on you. That's when I heard your dream…"

"_Alright alright. Settle down. Anyone else?" Iruka asked, eyes scanning the room once again. "How about, you Sasuke?"_

_Sasuke felt excitement bubble in him. He was proud of his dream. And with that he stood up. "My dream is to join the Konoha Police Force and protect everyone in the village! I'll keep my home safe from harm!"_

_The response to his answer was much different than Naruto's. Everyone broke into murmurs of how cool it was and the girls in the class squealed. Except for one. The pink haired girl in his peripheral vision was just looking at him quietly, a blush painted across her face. As he sat down, she turned back to her paper. He looked back out the window towards the Uchiha district. He would honor his family name and protect his home. _

"After you shared, I changed my answer." Sakura concluded, blushing slightly and looking back out to sea.

"What did you change your answer to?" Sasuke asked, genuinely curious.

"I said that my dream was to help you achieve yours." Sakura was still looking out and didn't notice the way Sasuke's eyes softened or how his cheeks were just a touch pinker than usual. "That was when my crush on you really developed. Before that, it was more of a bandwagon thing. I didn't have a lot of friends, and you were a favorite topic among the girls. Up until then, liking you had been a way in. Of course that changed when I actually started liking you for real."

"What was it about my dream that effected you so much?" Although the blush had faded Sasuke's eyes still held a softness that Sakura had never seen before. And after staring a second longer than socially acceptable Sakura managed to tear her eyes away and refocus them back on the sea. Her face flaming.

"Well…My parents were really low level shinobi. My mom had graduated the academy but essentially retired there and my dad was a genin but got badly injured on a C rank mission that ended his ninja career. Neither were particularly strong or adept at it. They annoyed and nagged me so much and there were times I thought it'd be better if I didn't have to hear it. I also resented them for not being stronger. They didn't have any special jutsu, techniques, or fighting styles. Maybe if they had been stronger, I would have been as well...But I didn't have friends when we were younger. They were all I had. And I would get nightmares all the time about how if someone attacked the village, my parents couldn't defend themselves. They almost didn't enroll me in the academy but I insisted because of those nightmares, not that I ever mentioned that to them." She shook her head a little trying to clear those thoughts away before smiling softly at Sasuke. "You were the first person to promise to protect everyone in the village. Back then Naruto's reason for being Hokage was about recognition. It was you who wanted to keep the village safe."

The wind blew through her hair making it look like flower petals dancing in the breeze. The clear blue of the sky made the pink of her hair pop. The green of the environment around them made her light green eyes flash brilliantly. Her dream had been to help him achieve his dream. Looking back on it, she always had. When he joined team 7 with only revenge as his goal, it had been her to reawaken the desire to protect. She had been the one to make him train for the lives of others instead of just the death of one. It was Naruto's forgiveness that saved him from drowning in darkness and set a tentative foot on the path of light but it was her forgiveness that made him want to trek down that path endlessly.

"Sakura. I'm re—" A loud squawk cut Sasuke off as they both looked up at the messenger hawk circling above their heads.

"For you?"

Sasuke frowned in confusion. "I don't think so…"

The hawk landed on the back of the bench and stuck out it's leg looking pointedly at Sakura. She took the message and after skimming it briefly, gave a tired smile.

"It's a summons back to the hospital. There's an Anbu squad from Sand coming in soon and they have severe injuries. I'm sorry Sasuke-kun, I'm gonna have to cut this short." She said, feeling a strange mix of pride in the fact that she was the one needed—not him, as well as disappointment at having to end this strange alone time with Sasuke. Interestingly enough, Sasuke was feeling a similar mix of pride and disappointment for much them same reasons.

"Whatever. I should have expected it given that my girlfriend is the best medical ninja in the world." Sasuke said with a careless shrug, although he was sharply watching for her reaction. It wasn't lost on him that he had been gone for two years and that while she clearly still held affection for him, the nature of her feelings may have changed.

Sakura's eyes went wide, her jaw almost dropping in shock. Everything about the statement had shocked her, from the admittance of his over sight to his unabashed praise, so much so that she almost missed what he called her. Almost.

"G-girlfriend…?"

"Sakura. While traveling, I've come to realize how important home is. A place that accepts you and welcomes you no matter what. Where you feel calmed and comforted by being there. Everyone seeks one, though it's not always the place where they came from."

"You always have a home in Konoha, Sasuke-kun." Sakura's voice was small and laced with confusion. He wasn't planning to leave for good, was he?

"Sakura. We're not in Konoha right now, but I feel perfectly at home. I think of Konoha as home, because it's your home."

That completely threw her. She was utterly shocked and could only manage a somewhat undignified "What?"

He couldn't blame her for her lack of comprehension. After all, he had rebuffed her affection so many times, and he wasn't winning any points for the two times he came close to acknowledging or accepting her love. The first time he merely thanked her, knocked her out and left her on a bench. The second time he rejected her offer to join him yet again and once again thanked her with a vague promise for a potential next time, before leaving her for two years with little to no correspondence. Still, he wished she would just understand. How had she done this so many times despite being rejected constantly? He felt more vulnerable and at risk than he had facing Kaguya. And with every moment that he spent saying it out loud, the more those feelings fortified themselves in him. He found himself unable to process what he would do if she rebuffed him the way he had her all these years. But he had to make her understand at the very least. That even if he did leave again, the one he was protecting was her and the place he was returning to was her side, and the person he was trying to become was one worthy of her.

"Sakura," he tried again, "when I'm with you I'm home. You are my home. You've always accepted me and welcomed me. You've always comforted and calmed me. You were the one that almost made me stay years ago. And despite everything you were always the last person I wanted to hurt."

So many things happened with Sakura at once that she couldn't keep track of all of the reactions she had. Her mind was in shock. She was blushing terribly. Her eyes were wide with happiness and watering with hurt. Her lips curved upwards in a sincerely happy smile. She figured this was probably up there on one of her least attractive moments. Sasuke would disagree.

Luckily when she did speak her voice was strong. "heh. Took you long enough...idiot." She mumbled.

Sasuke started smirking though it turned into a genuine smile. "I'm sorry I kept you waiting."

Just then the hawk squawked loudly fluttering its wings. It glared at Sakura a clear message in it's eyes. She needed to go. It squawked once more disapprovingly before taking off into the sky. Sakura glared at it annoyed that the moment she had waited for since she was five was being interrupted and wishing for the first time ever that she could shirk her responsibilities.

"Two and a half minutes." Sasuke sighed. "And here I was hoping to watch the sunset with you."

Sakura's gaze returned to Sasuke, her eyes softening and smiling gracing her features. "Sunset's still hours away Sasuke-kun."

"I've been away from home for a long time Sakura. Now that I'm back, I want to spend some time there…And you always liked doing that. You would sit up on that water tower and watch from there."  
Sasuke had been more attentive of her than she had realized. She didn't know what possessed her or if she was making a terrible mistake, but she found herself stepping closer to him, closing the distance. She smiled beautifully, her eyes dancing in a playful way.

"Next time, Sasuke-Kun" and with that she gently poked him on the forehead, as he done to her two years before. Sasuke's face flushed so strongly that it'd be impossible to deny that it was anything other than blushing. His heart pounded harder than it had on any other mission or fight he had been in. He stood completely dazed, his arm reaching up slowly to place a hand to his forehead. An action that Sakura had missed as she had already turned around to head to the tree line. Sasuke snapped himself out of his daze just in time to grab her arm before she took off. In one swift motion he turned her and pulled her against him, his fingers entangling themselves in her silky hair. While embrace was as brief as it was sudden but before letting her go completely, he kissed her on her forehead.

"Go save someone." He ordered gently, stepping away from her and smiling.

Sakura hummed in response, a gentle blush painting her cheeks and smile stretching across her lips. "Keep protecting our home." And with that she jumped off, the speed of her travel made her hair dance behind her.

Sasuke stared after her, his forgotten childhood dream resounding through his body with every heart beat.

"_My dream is to join the Konoha Police Force and protect everyone in the village! I'll keep my home safe from harm!" _

Sakura's soothing voice rang in his head with his marching orders: keep protecting our home.

"Always." He murmured quietly, before jumping up into the tree line following the woman who just left. The soft smile had yet to leave his face.

He would always protect his home. No matter what.


End file.
